Highest standard: Week 3 (final)

The mainstream media is doing an adequate (but not great) job of covering the incoming administration.  The coverage isn’t so much a matter of shining a light on questionable actions, but more trying to decide which unprecedented moves and threats to focus on.  That’s pretty much the most charitable way I can phrase it.  So  I don’t think it’s a good use of my time to continue to write these; just read the paper(s).

What is a good use of my time and yours is reaching out to friends and family and reminding them that opinionated news aggregators and even individual newspapers can report the same day quite differently.  Comparing say, Fox News and NY Times, one might wonder sometimes if they’re reporting on the same country (yes, I’m exaggerating a bit).  But if you average over 4 or 5 news sources, a picture starts emerging.  And I emphasize sources: aggregators don’t do any actual journalism, they merely exist to profit off people clicking on links.  And, please pay for your news.  If we keep ourselves willfully mis- or un-informed, it’s hard to be optimistic about where we’re headed.

Highest standard: Week 2

Reminder: we’ve made the choice who the president elect is.  It’s now time to hold him to the highest standard as we do for all presidents.  This is explicitly intended to be a nonpartisan post.  If you disagree with something I’ve written here or think it’s slanted, I’m genuinely curious why; please take the time to comment!

Since week 1, a few concerns remain unchanged:

1. No tax returns released.  Unprecedented in modern politics, has to be made right.
2. Operators of blind trust are members of transition team, creating clear conflict of interest.  Unprecedented in modern politics.
3. Appointment of Stephen Bannon as Chief of Strategy, who’s explicitly created a platform for “alt-right” and has published Antisemitic, racist, and misogynist content.  This is not a nomination to unite the country.  Hard to understand anyone of high character having a person like this as adviser.
4. Appointment of children as operators of “blind trust”.  Hard to understand how business will be operated “blindly”.  Not illegal for president and vice president, but would be illegal for lower-level officials in executive branch.

One concern was resolved:

1. Settled fraud lawsuits around Trump University (note, promised not to settle while campaigning).  There will probably be “no admission of guilt”.  Unprecedented in modern politics.

And several more issues arose:

1. Reported to be seeking security clearance for son-in-law to be made an adviser.  This would be actually illegal.
2. Evidence of personally operating on behalf of existing businesses and may be using PEOTUS status on their behalf.  This is unprecedented and ethically a gray area but probably not illegal.  If done as POTUS, it would be actually illegal.
3. Calls with heads of state on unsecured private cell phone.  At best careless.  And if the phone is android as evidence suggests, it’s quite possible that domestic, foreign, and/or private agencies could have recordings.
4. Senior and experienced members of transition team purged over what might have been a 10-year-old personal vendetta.  Not high character.
5. Off-the-record meeting with press to “rip them new assholes” over reporting.  Dangerous precedent to be setting.
6. Fabricated claim to have saved Ford plant from moving to Mexico.  Hard not to call this carefully crafted domestic propaganda.
7. Ongoing personal feud with major newspaper.  Not high character.

As an editorial aside, I’m surprised with how brazenly the president-elect is behaving, it’s happening very fast.  We’re going to have to be vigilant in not growing tired of these reports and normalizing failure to operate by the highest standard.

Highest standard: Week 1

Reminder: we’ve made the choice who the president elect is.  It’s now time to hold him to the highest standard as we do for all presidents.  This is explicitly intended to be a nonpartisan post.  If you disagree with something I’ve written here or think it’s slanted, I’m genuinely curious why; please take the time to comment!

I find the following hard to square with a person who’s operating by the highest standard:

1. No tax returns released.  Unprecedented in modern politics, has to be made right.
2. Upcoming fraud trial regarding Trump University.  Unprecedented in modern politics, has to be made right.
3. Operators of blind trust are members of transition team, creating clear conflict of interest.  Unprecedented in modern politics.
4. Appointment of Stephen Bannon as Chief of Strategy, who’s explicitly created a platform for “alt-right” and has published Antisemitic, racist, and misogynist content.  This is not a nomination to unite the country.  Hard to understand anyone of high character having a person like this as adviser.
5. Appointment of children as operators of “blind trust”.  Hard to understand how business will be operated “blindly”.  Not illegal for president and vice president, but would be illegal for lower-level officials in executive branch.
6. Threat of legal action to a sitting US Senator over criticism.  This is reminiscent of Richard Nixon, who was not a man of high character.

Mr. Trump: We’re holding you to the highest standard

Wouldn’t it be insulting to be held to anything less?  Whether you voted for the president elect or not, I hope that you’ll read this and find yourself agreeing.

The President of the United States is a position that demands the highest moral character.  There’s not much to say about the office that you don’t already know; POTUS commands a huge military, negotiates international treaties, sets domestic policy directions that can affect the world’s largest economy, and has been described as leader of the free world.  And sure, there are the nukes.  There’s a lot at stake.  We expect the executive in charge to uphold the best standard among us.

Have all, most — or even — many US Presidents lived up to that standard?  I’d say no.  When they’ve fallen short, have we generally called that out as a failure?  I’d say generally yes.  That’s as it should be.

We expect Mr. Trump to live up to the standard like all other presidents.  If he falls short, we must call that out as we would for every other president.  Given that Mr. Trump is generally considered the least politically experienced president-elect in US history — and many consider that a good thing — then the level of scrutiny must be even higher because less is understood about how he’ll govern.  The leash is that much shorter.  But it’s the same one we hold every president on.

If Mr. Trump fails to uphold that standard, we can’t excuse failures as “yeah but X would have been better/worse”.  When there was a choice between Mr. Trump and X in a matter, then “X would be better/worse” was an argument to ponder and debate, as it was for the last year and change.

But we just made the choice that Mr. Trump is the president elect.  He stands on his own and answers for his own actions.  If it helps, try the “Rick Astley test”: if the point “yeah but Rick Astley would have been better/worse” adds as much weight to your argument as “yeah but X would have been better/worse”, maybe reconsider the point.  This is pretty hard to get your mind to do and takes a lot of practice.

Trump has a checkered past, perhaps more so than recent presidents elect; at the very least, less is known about his finances and business operations.  But others have had checkered pasts too.  Past behavior doesn’t lower the bar of expectations or excuse failings.  If anything, that makes us more vigilant in watching for more smoke that might be coming from underlying fires.

To do all this, we need the help of government watchdogs.  Please pay for your free press.  Please promise to resist the temptation to propagate false “news” — of any ideological slant — no matter how tempting.  It’s very hard to resist and we’ll fail sometimes.

If you’ve made it this far and you find yourself unable to agree with the statement:

Mr. Trump: We’re holding you to the highest standard

then I’m genuinely curious why and would appreciate it if you left a comment here.  Thanks!

A two-question screen for character

I’ve found this to be a simple and pretty useful way to think about business associates, political candidates, etc.

1. Would I be comfortable with this person babysitting my kids / nieces / nephews?

Test of basic human decency: is this a generally good person or do they have serious character flaws?  There are very few people I associate with who fail this test, because why would I want to be around them.  The starting point for people you’ve just met is “I don’t know yet” (if it’s not, you’re prejudiced), and I find I can answer this question pretty quickly.  If a person passes, you can move on to the next question.

2. Would I be comfortable giving this person access to my bank account?

This is more complex and difficult.  I think most people are good and decent, but the real test of character is when you’re in a difficult situation, or you’re alone and facing strong temptations.  I think it takes a lot more to find this out about someone, and I don’t think most of the people I know, I know well enough to answer this definitively — but I trust that most would pass.  (If thoughts about audit trails and access controls and fraud insurance come to mind when trying to answer this, then you’re probably an engineer and you’re overthinking it.)

Getting past this simple screen is just the first step of course: you next have to ask yourself whether the person is well suited for the relationship you’re considering.  But that’s obviously case by case.  And failing the bank account test isn’t necessarily a fatal error; I’ve associated with people who I don’t think pass it, but it does rule out some kinds of interactions.

Let’s try this out on the 2016 US presidential candidates.  I haven’t met either one, but they’ve been public figures long enough that I feel I have a read on them.  I would definitely feel comfortable with Hillary Rodham babysitting my kids (if I had them); I think fundamentally she’s a decent human being, and a mother and grandmother besides.  I doubt there are many sane people of any political alignment who would disagree with that in private, although of course opponents would feel compelled to say otherwise on TV (and yes, I’m wary of the “no true Scotsman” hazard there).  I think there’s a lot more room for disagreement on access to bank account, and I don’t see much benefit from discussing that further here.  This is how a good number of politicians tot up in my mind, but maybe not a majority.

Now let’s look at Donald.  He fails the babysitting test so spectacularly that it feels like there should have been a question number (0) to weed him out already.  I would be worried about Donald sexually abusing my kids or bilking them in some way, let alone the bad example I would fear his character would set.  I doubt even his ardent supporters would disagree with that, in private.  And if you wouldn’t let him babysit your kids, why would you trust him as president to help determine their future?